Unreachable

Your mind is a cage.
You live behind invisible bars.
Your world is completely your own
No such words as 'us' or 'ours'.

You have the pride of a lion,
the temperament of a bear.
Pacing around your territory
growling at the air.

Ever protecting that which
lives beneath your skin.
Walling the world out
whilst bricking yourself in.

You stand behind a sheet of glass
regardless of where you are.
I try to reach beyond the barriers
but my mind can't stretch that far.

Your soul is a prison in a prison
so many guards, cells and locks.
Our friendship is a maze in a maze
with twists and turns and blocks.

I see my travelled path fuelled by wrath.
The things I thought,
the things I'd say.
I too believed I was so strong
I could push the whole, wide world away!

Your fireworks of fury fooled me
into thinking you were strong.
With your cast iron independence
but I couldn't have been more wrong.

As the loving, bright, light shone
I saw you retreat into the shade.
Convinced your cage was safer
Your prison is self made.

You sentenced yourself to life
playing judge and jury,
living with a constant threat
of fear giving way to fury.

I saw you in the shadows
peering out at me.
I blinked with disbelief
at what I could suddenly see...

A tiny, terrified being
A child trapped in the night.
No longer afraid of the dark
but cowering from the light.

J.E.P Wilson P-Poet.